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Projecting

Angel says several times that he and Buffy cannot work because he can't give her children and she should have a normal life. Is he just projecting his wants and needs onto Buffy, because what he really wants is children and a normal life?

In the comics (After the Fall), he's turned human and says something like "it always happens at the wrong time". The thing is that it will never be the "right" time; it wasn't in IWRY, it wasn't when he caused LA to be sent to Hell.

Angel had a son, but we didn't see him raise Connor; people tend to think he would be a wonderful father, but who knows? His existence was a miracle, Angel was amazed and happy about the baby, feeding him the bottle, changing diapers and saving for his future - but as soon as Connor showed to be a troubled teenager, his solution was send him away.

Honestly, how many people do not have children, although they want to ? How many ways are there today, to have children, even if you can not procreate ? How many people want children at the age of seventeen ? Buffy certainly does not want them then. Why do you have to make decisions regarding your life with 27 or 37, while you are 17 ? Life is, what is happening, while you are busy making other plans.

As for the normal life - can a slayer really have a normal life ? Did Buffy ever have a normal life ? If you are supernatural and fight vampires, demons and the Forces of darknes on a daily Basis, wouldn`t it be better, to have a partner in life, who knows about the supernatural, understands it and is your equal, because he also is "not-normal", just like you ?

Honestly, how many people do not have children, although they want to ? How many ways are there today, to have children, even if you can not procreate ? How many people want children at the age of seventeen ? Buffy certainly does not want them then. Why do you have to make decisions regarding your life with 27 or 37, while you are 17 ? Life is, what is happening, while you are busy making other plans.

As for the normal life - can a slayer really have a normal life ? Did Buffy ever have a normal life ? If you are supernatural and fight vampires, demons and the Forces of darknes on a daily Basis, wouldn`t it be better, to have a partner in life, who knows about the supernatural, understands it and is your equal, because he also is "not-normal", just like you ?

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It kind of makes more sense when you keep in mind that Angel was an 18th century man as a human. Someone with that upbringing would be more likely to think that people must get married and have children, that girls should think of getting married at 17, that you must live 'till death do you part' with whoever you marry and, if you're a girl especially, you must marry whoever you start a relationship with at 17, and would also be likely to overlook artificial insemination or adoption as options.

As for whether Angel wants children and 'normal life' - I think it's somewhat similar to Buffy thinking about wanting 'normal life' or a 'normal' human boyfriend - he probably thinks on some level he should want it more than he actually wants it. Keeping in mind what he was like as a human, as well as his upbringing and his father's disapproval (Liam was jobless*, aimless and unmarried in his mid-20s, going out drinking, fighting and sleeping around, while secretly dreaming of traveling to faraway places, seeing the world and doing exciting things, instead of settling for the life his father thought he should have), he probably never really wanted 'normal life' even when he was able to have it, but he has his guilt and his father's voice somewhere deep inside, as Superego, telling him he should prove himself worthy now of being a human and gaining the right to have that 'normal life'.

*And when I say jobless - I don't mean in the sense that he was seeking a job on the job market and couldn't find it - as a merchant's only son, he would have naturally been expected to help with and eventually take over the family business. But he obviously wasn't doing that - whether because he was always disinterested, or because he tried at some point and realized it wasn't for him. In any case, he expressed a certain amount of contempt for his father's low-brow parvenu mentality (the way he talks about his father to another drunk in Becoming flashback, mocking him for having silver cutlery but eating with his hands), and as a vampire, Angel obviously showed an appreciation of culture and arts, like ballet, and liked to live in pseudo-aristocratic looking surroundings in seasons 1-2 of BtVS.

However, I think that he'd find it far less appealing if he actually were to become human, he'd miss his superstrength, and that he'd still want to be fighter and 'champion'/hero. I haven't read the AtF comics (didn't he become temporarily human in them?), but I think that, even if he were to become human, he'd rather try to be a demon-hunter like Gunn or Wood rather than just work as insurance salesman and raise children, or something.

Last edited by TimeTravellingBunny; 01-02-18 at 09:26 PM.

You keep waiting for the dust to settle and then you realize it; the dust is your life going on. If happy comes along - that weird unbearable delight that's actual happy - I think you have to grab it while you can. You take what you can get, 'cause it's here, and then...gone.

He's allowing considerations that aren't current ones really to come to the fore and perhaps that's in great part because they are already struggling to keep their physical relationship limited, but also just generally that he's worrying about restricting her perhaps. I think really that is what the children aspect represents. It's just true that there are things that she could enjoy in another relationship that she can't with him, even if she wanted to, and I think that he does consider her age and her certainty that this is what she wants and questions whether she truly knows. If they hadn't been struggling to keep their physicality limited though, or they hadn't already been questioning some aspects of their relationship (Buffy actually raises some of the things the Mayor does before they have that meeting, during their picnic if I remember rightly), the things that Buffy will miss the opportunity of wouldn't have been an extra weight that had impact on how he felt. I don't think, that Angel is projecting the issues of children/normality onto her though.

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Maybe Angel's talk of marriage and children a test for Buffy, to see if she really does love him and will stay with him even when faced with what she'll lose. It's similar to him wanting her to declare her love for him before he told her about his obsession with Dru and what he did to her. If he took these issues of marriage and children seriously, and he was worried that he was limiting Buffy's life, then he should have been strong enough to end the relationship before it got too serious.

In the comics (After the Fall), he's turned human and says something like "it always happens at the wrong time". The thing is that it will never be the "right" time; it wasn't in IWRY, it wasn't when he caused LA to be sent to Hell.

Angel had a son, but we didn't see him raise Connor; people tend to think he would be a wonderful father, but who knows? His existence was a miracle, Angel was amazed and happy about the baby, feeding him the bottle, changing diapers and saving for his future - but as soon as Connor showed to be a troubled teenager, his solution was send him away.

I wonder the extent to which Angel's ideal is wrapped up with innocence? IMO, lodged away in his unconscious is his father's comment about Liam "corrupting Kathy" AS11: 10). Perhaps Angel values "innocence" in order to prove his father wrong? Alternatively, values innocence because his father did? Once something is no longer wholesome he rejects it.